An Interview with “Diamond Wizard” Maarten de Witte: Part 3

Territories and Computers

First, they decided that Hearts on Fire would be tagged as “The World’s Most Perfectly Cut Diamond.” Next, they had to find partners for retail distribution.

A big part of that was figuring out territorial exclusivity. As de Witte pointed out, that’s one of the biggest questions there is in geography. 

What defines a territory? Is it the demographics? The geography? The income level? If you go into a town, for instance, New York City, you’re not going to give exclusivity to one retailer! That would be insane. There are millions of people that one retailer can’t possibly service. Furthermore, on a single city block, you have paying customers that don’t overlap. So, we decided to look at data based on zip codes.

This led to developing a sophisticated computer program that mapped out potential retailer jewelers across the country. “I started with a commercial package for this programming, then spent the next seven years tweaking and perfecting it.” The result was a map that allowed you to find retailers, click on them, and see all sorts of data — everything from their credit rating to the brands they carried